Chapter 48
FORTY-EIGHT
FENRIR
PRESENT
It doesn’t take her long to fall asleep, which is no surprise considering what she did to me just forty minutes ago.
It was wild. I’ve never had a woman take control like that.
I didn’t think I’d like it if I’m honest. But fuck me, it was so blindingly hot, I can still feel the aftershocks, still feel her thighs gripping me, the clench of her pussy around my cock as she came.
But now, she’s sleeping next to me, her hair a dark sprawling mass like a halo, her breath so light compared to the heavy breathing she’d been doing earlier. And I take the opportunity to read some more of Junko’s journal.
Day Twenty-four
The days are blurring together. Aside from the store deliveries, nothing marks the passing of time here—just the switch from day to night, and the nights are always the worst. I fill the daylight hours pressing wildflowers, making dorayaki, writing in this journal.
But when darkness comes, I feel it—the house pressing in, a presence I can’t name.
Two nights ago, I woke outside. No memory of leaving my bed.
Just cold air, stones under my feet, and a knife in my hand.
There was blood on the blade. I don’t know whose.
I don’t know how I got there. I only remember the fear—fear that I’d hurt someone, fear that the house had taken hold of me.
Barrett found me. Markus was there too, his hand on his holstered gun.
They say I was sleepwalking. I let them believe it.
Barrett locked me in a guest room “for my own safety.” But I saw the looks he and Markus were giving each other. They think I’m mad.
Maybe I am. Or maybe it’s this house.
I lay awake all night afraid of what Barrett would do with his mad wife, if this was to be my new life—locked away here, or later in some hospital. In the morning, I feared the worst, that this room would be my prison, until I realised I’d missed my period.
Scrambling through my toiletries bag, I was relieved to find a test but terrified to use it.
The test confirmed it: I’m pregnant. I’m not sure how I feel, but it’s not the way I expected to feel—excited, jubilant. Instead, I feel afraid. Afraid of what this means, of how this changes things. It isn’t just about me anymore. But here and now, the child changes everything.
I can’t be sent away.
As soon as Barrett came to the room, I wasted no time and told him, with as much delight as I could muster, that I was carrying his child.
His reaction was cautious, but I could see a degree of pleasure on his face.
He’d finally got what he wanted, and so he agreed we can leave this house today. For that alone, I’m truly grateful.
Because I’m convinced something in these walls is trying to consume me.
And if nothing else, this baby has saved me from an unknown fate. But what awaits us both, I have no idea. All I know is that we are going home today.
This will be my last entry. I’m leaving this journal here in the library. I don’t want these memories coming with me, and if anyone finds it, they’ll know what lives here.
Kuchisake-Onna.